Barnabas
Little Foxes
On 1986's Little Foxes, Brian Belew's pyrotechnic guitar leads continued to push the sound of Barnabas over the top. He was well known as a human dynamo of an axeman, one who routinely wow'd audiences by combining in-concert acrobatics with the fact that he never missed a note! Brian had an amazing ability to use tapping techniques, (pioneered by Eddie Van Halen), in incendiary ways that had never been heard before in Christian rock. Gary Mann's bass style was heavily influenced by bassists Geddy Lee of Rush and Dave Hope of Kansas. Gary drove the band from beneath, his playing coupling beautifully with the powerhouse drumming of Kris Klingensmith. Kris emerged as a talented lyricist, writing the words to nearly all of the band's songs on the last three albums as well as the notable words on the back cover of the Little Foxes album. Little Foxes marks the next step of Barnabas moving beyond the experimental and progressive sounds of Approaching Light Speed and Feel the Fire to embrace an all-out metal assault. Gone are most of the complex progressive pieces with keyboards that gave the listener moments to breathe on previous albums. Little Foxes is overflowing with urgency and is nothing less than full-on bombastic heavy metal at it's finest! The band seemed to know their final collective voice needed music as heavy as the message. Even in 2017, the message and the in-your-face metallic riffage remain engaging and mesmerizing. For fans of Jerusalem, Philadelphia, Metal Church, Saint, Testament, and Accept!